I voted for “Dumb” because that’s what I have, but my intent is to eventually have aux switches. They are low priority for me compared to adding more smart switches.
Only aux switches ever to have the same functionality at every switch position.
I have only 3 x 3-way circuits in my home. Top/bottom of main stairs has two LZW-30SN, but this does not work as expected (*), and I will probably replace one with an Aux switch one day. The other two have dumb switches because that secondary switch is not used often, and required no scene control or dimming, and functions just fine with the dumb switch.
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- I’ve set association (works), associate behaviour =11 and local relay off on the non-load. Both relays still click, and if the non-load switch is used to turn off the light, HA still shows the light to be on. It’s functional as far as my family sees, but I know it’s not working as expected.
I initially had the electrician install generic aux’s for 11 3-way configurations in my home. After moving in, though, I had him replace all but 2 of those with ‘dumbed’ Inovelli Blues so that I could use Zigbee bindings for the 3-way connection rather than wired electricity. (I wanted a consistent look throughout the home.) Unfortunately, 2 of the 11 couldn’t be replaced without opening the walls again because the aux boxes were too tight to fit the Inovelli Blues. It’s fine, but I do wish I’d just had him install 11 ‘dumbed’ Inovelli Blues from the get-go.
I’m having major issues with SmartThings right now, but the Zigbee Bindings I setup prior to the app becoming unresponsive are still working and my 3-ways are working great with 1 switch on a single pole and the other switch serving as a Zigbee relay only. I just wish I could get Smartthings to pick up the Edge Driver signal again so that I could finish the setup for the other 3-ways in my home. (And I’m sort of nervous that the # of 3-ways I was setting up may have been a factor in ST’s failure to work for me anymore because the failure coincided with me setting up another seven Zigbee bindings to create this type of dumb 3-way switching.
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I see a lot of threads on all the boards, reddit and facebook with people building new houses and how they should prep for their smart home. I don’t think I’ve ever seen size of boxes come up, but it should. For the 50c or so per box, anybody building and interested in smart home should be springing for the extra deep boxes. Devices are getting smaller yes, but there’s still often more wires and bundles done. Sucks you’ve got some shallow ones, but this is something I’ll be starting to recommend to others in those threads so hopefully your experience will help someone else.
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They’re in places that aren’t that obvious. Overall, I’m really pleased with how it all turned out. They look beautiful throughout the home, and I love that up is always on, down is always off, etc.
I know you said you won’t be doing this, but for three of my 3-way switches, I used smart switches at both ends. I wanted to get the dimming and LED notifications on both ends.
I have a 4-way switch where I’m using dumb switches, but it’s only because I ran out of Inovelli Blues (I only ordered 20).